Mysore Trip - Day 2

Day 1 of the trip ended in some confusion over the hotel rooms. We needed 2 rooms because we were four people. But the guy in hotel goofed up and we had to find another room at 11 PM!

Anyway, the next morning we woke up at 8.30AM in our new room at The Gallery view hotel right opposite the Jaganmohan Palace which is also the Art Gallery.

After a few hiccups with an auto driver which led to much bigger hiccup between me and my wife, we started planning our day. We ate mallige idlies for breakfast in Hotel Siddhartha. I strongly recommend this place - very clean and reasonably priced.

Our travel day started with Chamundi betta.

Chamundi Hills

The drive up to Chamundi Hills is serene. On the wat there is the Karanji lake. The views of the Lalith Mahal palace on the way is fantastic.

On top of Chamundi betta, is a huge statue of Mahishasura greeting you. The temple's gopura can be seen from quite a distance. Like any other pilgrimage place, it was very crowded. Sunday is completely different day in the calender of the indian tourist. Every place looks so scrowded. And the same place when visited on a weekday would seem like heaven!

Anyway, it was a long queue for drashan of Chamundeshwari. There were lot of people and quite some pushing around. The sevaks also looked ill-trained to handle crowds. But on darshan it felt good. The deity was done up nicely.

Shots here:

























View of Lalith Mahal from Chamundi betta:




















Somnathapura

Tucked away deep in Mandya district are the magnificent ruins of Somnathapura. It's 40Km from Mysore near Bannur. We drove through the countryside of Karnataka - the richer side of Mandya district.

As we arrived in Somnathapura, we had some Tea in local tea shop. There was an art store with bronze structures and carvings made by different tribals in India. That was a unique collection of bronze art and resembled the kinds we'd read in history textbooks about the Harappan culture. The stuff there is really impressive - but then so are the prices! There were art items from Todas in Nilgiris, Gonda tribe in Madhya Pradesh and some Naga tribal art too!

The main monument of Somnathapura is very well protected. The entire complex is beautifully maintained. The lawns all around the temple gives an impressive backdrop for the main attarction.

The deepa sthamba of the Keshava temple:
























The temple has some of the most intricate carvings I've seen made on soapstone.
Most of the sculptures are based on Ramayana, Mahabharata and other Vishnu's avatars. As we drove out of Somnathapura back to Mysore, it was a feeling of satisfaction.

Mysore Trip - Day 1

Last weekend was yet another fantabulous weekend. We traveled to Mysore and wanted to show Aunty and Pixie around Mysore.

We left Bangalore by the 5.30 AM train – Kaveri Express. We reached Mysore by 8.30AM. We found a hotel Abhishek assisted and recommended by an auto driver. We checked in and wasted no time in getting onto the road.

Mysore Palace

We reached the Mysore Palace by 10AM. The first sight of the palace is impressive. The new palace was built to completion in 1912 by JayaChamaraja Wodeyar. The older palace as one is told repeatedly was burnt down in 1897. A few parts of the old palace have been preserved. The old palace was built in wood. The new palace in contrast is a modern structure.

The palace looks grand from the outside. The insides of the palace are stunning in places and a bit mediocre in some other. There are a huge number of paintings in the palace, not necessarily connected by any particular theme. Most of the paintings depict the royal processions taken out during the dashera season. I believe that Mysore is completely lit up quite spectacularly during the dashera season. The flooring had very interesting patterns of what I thought looked like regular symmetrical figures. I was seriously reminded of some algebra from college.

It takes a long time to explore the different parts of the palace. It requires good stamina and enthu to completely go through all the art work in the palace.

There are 6 temples inside the palace complex- very nice sculpture on the Gopuras. One such temple is:

Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary

20 Km drive from Mysore is Ranganathittu. It’s a group of small islands on the Kaveri River. Some of the most beautiful birds of the world have made it their home for nesting. One auto driver outside had this to say when I asked him what was to see in Ranganathittu – “Saar, adu foreign inda paksheegallu ella barrate saar. Tumba channage irratey nodakke.” – meaning that there are lots of birds that come from foreign countries and nest here.

As you go into the sanctuary you are greeted by some loner birds here and there. But as you go deeper into the woods and the riverside the beauty and serenity of the place magnifies. The best part is the boat ride – one gets to see such amazing flying angels. Storks, Herons, Pelicans, Swans, Ducks and a good variety of other birds rarely seen in everyday life are in plenty. This is not the season for migratory birds in India and yet we saw so many varieties of birds.

I tried my photography skills with the limited feature set available on my Sony DSC-P2. I did manage to get a few nice shots of the birds.

Here’s a shot of a bird walking straight into a croc! But we didn’t witness any predatory scene there.

Even the lawns of the sanctuary outside are very neatly kept. We just laid there and chatted for a good long time about the beauty of the flora and fauna of the place. We took a long walk along the banks of the river. The sound of bamboos in the cool wind was music to all our ears. An abandoned boat on the bank fascinated Pixie quite a bit and she went crazy clicking the snaps of the boat.

The Lover trees as we named them was another fascinating display of nature’s magic. See this snap and you’ll understand what I’m talking about.

These are actually two different intertwined into each other’s metabolism so wonderfully. I really wonder what phenomenon of nature caused this kind of Siamese twin like trees!

This is a shot of the herons I took just before we left Ranganathittu.

We just relaxed in the lawns for quite a while and took a walk around the sanctuary. Some more shots we took there:






































Brindavan Gardens

We drove off in our hired cab from Ranganathittu with memories of the beauty of the place and music of the wind in the bamboo shoots.

Brindavan and KRS are nice sights but a bit too crowded. The dancing musical fountain and the illumination is definitely good and worth the hype.

Vehicles of GODs

Yesterday we were in Somnathapura near Mysore. It's one of the most amazing monuments I've seen of the Hindu civilization. More details about the trip will come later; but here I just wanted to recap some points of Hindu mythology before I forget. Most of this recap is due to the guide at Somnathpura, Mr. Ramakrishna, an amzing guy - deserves to be a teacher!

GOD	Role	Vehicle used for transportation
Bramha	Creator	Swan(Hamsa)
Saraswathi	Goddess of Education	Peacock(Mayura)
Vishnu	Protector	Eagle(Garuda)
Lakshmi	Goddess of Wealth	Elephant(Gaja)
Shiva	Destroyer	Bull(Nandi)
Parvathi	Goddess of Strength	Lion(Simha)

Other important Gods and their vahanas are :

Indra - Airavatha - 4-tusked White Elephant
Ganesha - Mushika - Mouse
Karthikeya - Mayura - Peacock

Another recap - the 10 avatars of Vishnu were :

1. Matsya avatar - Fish
2. Kurma avatar - Tortoise
3. Varaha avatar - Boar(Pig)
4. Narasimha avatar - Half man, half lion
5. Vamana avatar - A dwarf brahmin
6. Parashurama - Angry sage
7. Rama - We all know Rama
8. Krishna - Hare Krishna
9. Buddha - Messenger of peace
10. Kalki - Yet to occur!

I went into a nice trip of hindu mythology yesterday.

I'm also trying to recap some other childhood stories. I've already forgotten the details of these told by my grandmom, Appa and Amma. I'll just list down the titles for now - but I really want to jot down the details somewhere :

1. Ottey Chana kathey
2. Mudki Payasa
3. Kagi Gubbi kathey
4. Orulu beku

Will post a detailed account of the trip tomorrow.

2 more fundas I learnt from the Guide:

GOD = Giver, Operator and Destroyer -> The trinity of Hindu Gods

LOVE = Look, Observe, Verify and Enjoy :)

Lalbagh

Wednesday was an awesome day. Both Pooja and I bunked office and decided to chill out at home and go to Lalbagh. It started off very well with a lunch at MTR. Yummm ..hmmm .. Those're the word to describe the lunch at MTR. It's a long 6-7 course Karnataka meal. I went on almost till the last course. Pooja and Aunty retired much earlier!

Then to cool off and help the cause of digestion of the food, we went for a walk into Lalbagh. Lalbagh has always been one of my favourite places in Bangalore. The walk around the lake is usually divine. But this time it was really special. The weather was simply superb. The grey skies have returned to Bangalore and brought back its old glory.



This is a shot I took from the Glass house.



The view from the bench where we sat and chatted for a long time. What you can't see in the picture is the wind and feelings of the people at the place. Divine - is an understatement!



We discovered this Nagalinga pushpa by accident. This tree was near the nursery. When you open up the flower, it looks like a small Linga covered by the hood of snakes above. Quite a rare and exotic flower that grows straight out of the trunk of the tree. It was a beautiful sight with the wind blowing and the slight drizzle making the flowers drop down at a regular rate.



The famous Queen's flower seen all around Bangalore. The pavements off MG Road have a lot of these trees.



This picture summarizes the day. Quite an amazing day! After that we went to Prasanna doddappa's house and Anand Uncle's house. Spent very good quality family time. God, I love them all :-)

Mumbai Xpress

We watched this movie day before yesterday. Kamal Hassan's Mumbai Xpress is a total laugh riot. That's the only word that aptly describes the movie.

Forget your brain and logic, just enjoy the moments in the movie. Vijay Raaz as Digambar is amazing. The entire story has been very well intertwined as a comedy of errors. The planner of the kidnap plot, Digambar has his assistants in the form of Johnson and another guy.

I think I'm pretty bad at reviewing movies. I can't write a story too well. So I leave you to google for the movie's reviews. But, I would strongly recommend it as a 'must see' wholesome family entertainer.

Tanjore Paintings

Yesterday we visited Vimal's Aunt's house. She is into making Tanjore paintings.

Thanjavur, situated in the Kaveri delta is the origin of one of the most exquisite arts in South India. It's an amzing amalgamation art and crafts. The basic paintings are all based on mythology. Some of the famous paintings include the Ramar pattabhishekam or Rama's coronation ceremony. We have this paiting at home in Pondicherry.

The way the painting is created really painstaking and cumbersome. The base painting is first created on cloth. Then using only vegetable dyes and water colour, the figure is enhanced. Then, gold paper is stuck and stones are planted at appropraite place to create a 3D effect. The end result is quite stunning.

There are amazing photos on the web describing the Tanjore paintings.

saraswathi

Water

June 5th was World Environment day. We celeberated it on June 3rd at Philips. One Dr. Rajeev Gowda was invited as Chief Guest on that day to speak on Green Cities. He is a Prof at IIM Bangalore and a Ph.D from Wharton. He's also a budding politician - a congress party member.

He made a very interesting point during his speech. India certainly missed the industrial revolution. But when it happened in England, London went through exactly the same mess as Bangalore is goinf through today. Bangalore's the spear head of the IT revolution. This en-masse migration to the city, unscruplus expansion and rotten politics is killing the place defintely. But, there might be hope! London went through the same kind of mess - pollution, mass migration and poor infra-structure.

Very near home, Delhi's been doing pretty well. Thanks primarily to the supremem court. CNG buses and autos - half the pollutants are off. Bring in a mass rapid transit system, people start discovering each other! Hopefully, Bangalore may be saved before it drowns.

The real danger is in fact Water. We know the famous saying that the future wars will be fought over water. We know from the past the way Tamil Nadu and Karnataka fight over the Kaveri. The same story is repeated in Punjab and Haryana for the Yamuna waters. Across the border, Punjab and Sindh fight like dogs for the water of the Indus.

Traditionally, south Karnataka had a very good system of water conservation through keres. Whether it the good looking Ulsoor kere pretty much in the heart of the city, the Lalbagh kere - south karnataka has a system of channels where in the overflow from one tank goes into the next and thus also recharges the ground water. We don't have any major rivers in South Karnataka. The Kaveri is a good 100Km from Bangalore. This great river also is in the record books for being the most utilized river on earth.

With these keres slowly disappearing - some dried up, some lost to utter negligence and hyacinth, lots lost to so called development of layouts. Jayanagar T Block today stands on a former lake. So the Majestic bus stand. In my lifetime, I've seen the disappearance of a lake in Pondicherry. The lovely greenary on the way to school, suddenly became a VVP Nagar one day!!

What is the way ahead now? Compulsory rain water harvesting? As usual, the biggest problem is : how do you enforce it? The crazy floods that happen after every rain are a direct result of the blocking of the natural channels of water flow. Somehow, we need to restore the old dys of water conservation all over south karnataka. It was a sad state when I saw Arsikere completely dry on the way back from Kemmanagundi. So are numeruos lakes in Tumkur district.

Okay - that's the bleak picture. Some kind of time travel - we should see the glorious past. We love our glorious past don't we? All of us Indians .. Do we have that glorious a future? May be the pollution and public transport will be taken care. But, Water will be the most important decider!

Adityaya Namaha

We have saluted the Sun in Indian culture since time immemorial. It's an infinite source(may be infinitely measurable) of energy. We worship it in the form of Surya bhagavan. We salute the sun as part of Surya Namaskar. We assosciate exposure to sun to perform yoga as a divine routine.

Now we need to extend this practice to other spheres of life. The energy is there to be tapped. We are blessed with so much sunshine every year. Let's start utilising this abundant source of energy for our needs.

Some ideas and products that already exist :

- Solar water heaters (domestic and industrial)
- Solar Cookers - We've seen this in action
- Dry your clothes in the sun ( rather than use high energy consuming washing machine dryers)
- Solar recharge batteries ( if they dont exist already, i hope they are developed soon enough)
- Solar buses ( Heard that Reva is already getting down to this)
- Solar street lights ( This concept has been around since my school days - but may be it is still very expensive - but in quite a few remote locations, this is the best source. I remember that in Jungle lodges, this was the mode of camp lighting)
- Photo Voltaic Cells - Imagine the power that can be tapped from the Thar desert
- Water purification - Read the dynamised water concept of Auroville
- Water desalination kits

Imagine, the amount of energy saved by these small steps will relieve the country's energy bills. The Govt. also should promote these by giving good concessions. I've heard that in Germany there are very good incentives for solar energy usage.

The per capita carbon emission of India is around 0.25 metric tonnes. This is still one fourth the world average. This is still 1/22nd of what that terrorist country in the West which Columbus discovered by accident, emits. All this despite the sad statistic that 65% of the rural households in India still burn firewood or animal dung for fuel. Isn't it time to change the face of India? We can show the world how to efficiently re-use and recycle energy.

!! Om Adityaya namaha !!

Where do I want to be ..

Don't we all have that dream profession that we really think would be the ideal one? I so often sit and wonder what is it that will make me really happy doing.

The list of things that fascinate me are :

-  Travel
-  History
-  Talking - may be eventually some kind of a public speaking
-  Teaching mathematics - high school level

I wonder what's happened to my academic enthu. I used to love reading .. I loved solving problems in Math. Now everything work related takes a cynical twist. Where's that enthu gone?

I thought I was good at writing. But when I started writing those essays for b-school, I was pathetic. My english was bad! My sentences had grammatical mistakes!! And I thought I was used in writing !!

History fasciantes me still. If the history is related to mystery - even more so. Hampi in North Karnataka is so mysterious. So is Angkor Vatt in Cambodia. That's the latest addition to my list of must do historical places. Of course, the pyramids of Egypt are still high in the list.

I really want to live in an Indian village for a while. Say teach some high school maths to kids. Tell them the basics of calculus. Wouldn't that be fun? Implement some basic things that will improve the life of those people. And live in the midst of green fields and clean unpolluted air while doing this.

Solar energy is of course another interest. I need to go beyond just redaing about it and make something. Some sites give procedures to make these things.

Ok - to begin with - I still need to start gymming and cut down this flab of mine!

The Grand Wedding!

We are back after attending the Prince of Pattambi's wedding reception in the capital of his kingdom.

Trips, Pooja and I left from home by around 12.30 PM on Saturday afternoon. We drove drove and reached Pattambi at 11 PM that night. The Prince was in the hotel where we were staying. Met him for a very brief period and just damar crashed.

The next morning at around 10 AM Trips came and woke us up saying the reception had been advanced and it was in the afternoon itself. So we got up and started getting ready at a good pace.

When I was in the bathroom, I heard a loud orchestra of conch shells and drum beating in traditional kerala style. That was the arrival of the Prince to the stage. We got ready and went to the hall. The Prince and the new Princess Sharanya were there attired in suit-boot and saree
respectively.

There was an elephant parked outside the hall decorated in gold the kinds i've seen in mysore dashera functions. So we suspect he either rode in to the hall on that or was going to leave on that !!

The praja that attended were from far away lands and places. The whole of Pattambi was definitely there. So were people like Ankur who had flown in from Jammu for the occasion.

We had a full scale mallu lunch. After the lunch we were so stuffed - we wanted to take a walk in Pattambi. So we asked people around there whether there was anything to see in Pattambi. One uncle's jaw dropped and said you have already seen whatever is there to see in Pattambi. We decided that it was a stupid idea and so left Pattambi by around 1.30 PM. Drove through the greenary of Kerala's Palakkad district.

Some comments on the drive part :

- The contrast in the green levels of Kerala and TN were sucha contrast. The moment you cross the border, the trees are gone! The thick lush greenary is replaced by shrubbery all around!!

- Had fun driving on the highways with zebra-crossings ;) .. Not a joke!!

- The four lane highway from Krishnagiri onwards is cool. But the people driving on them are as stupid as they were!! Slow trucks spewing smoke and taking a good 1/2 hour to overtake the guy in front and thus causing a convoy of vehicles to be formed behind!

- On the return trip, we stopped at Tiruppur - the T-shift capital of India, Did some cool shopping of T-shirts that were meant to become Banana Republic and Sears branded - for 70-80 Ruppes :))) .. that was really worth it!

We have a photo taken at the reception. Will upload it tomorrow.

Motorcycle diary

I just wanted to blog that crazy trip of ours. It all started when on Friday morning we felt like getting out of town. I started looking up jungle lodges and some other resorts. All were booked!

Tour sketch:

Bike travelled on : Suzuki Fiero

Start 6.30 AM, 4th June, 2005 - Bangalore

Route followed : Blore - Nelamangala - Kunigal - Hassan - Belur - Chikmagalur - Kemmanagundi.

Time taken : Close to 11 hours - breaks almost every 1/2 hour. Final stretch from Chikmagalur to Kemmanagundi was bad! But very scenic and beautiful :) NH 4 upto Nelamangala - NH 48 upto Hassan - SH from Hassan to Chikmagalur - village road from Chikmagalur to Kemmanagundi.

Reached Kemmanagundi : 5.30 PM

Here's the general landscape of the area between Chikmagalur and Kemmanagundi.






5th June, 2005 : Woke up to see a beautiful mist outside our room. Slight rain!

Started trek to Hebbe falls at 1.00 PM .. Couldn't find the way on our own. Spoke to 3 kids and engaged them as our guides - Harish, Nagaraj and Manikandan. Amazing trek through forests and coffee estates. One part is very steep - down, down and down while going! Up, up and up while climbing back.

Saw some wonderful wild flowers and orchids growing on trees. We've brought home 2 orchids. Hope they grow on our tree.

We saw this beautiful sunset on the way back:



Got back to the room by evening. Shifted to Raja Bhavan in the morning. Much better room, awesome lighting.

Had a cold water bath. Sat down in the garden steps. What an amazing sky we saw!! Star-studded. Fantastic wind. Spoke and chatted and felt very romantic!

6th June, 2005 : Woke up to a lovely day again. Went down to the canteen for breakfast. Started on a trek to Z-point by accident. What an amazing place! What views! Really awesome.

This snap was taken on the Z-point:



Started back to Bangalore at 1.30PM. Decided to take the other route.

Return journey: 1.30 PM

Route : Kemmanagundi - Lingdahalli - Birur - Arsikere - Tiptur - Tumkur - Bangalore

NH 206 was beautiful. Lovely views. Landscape changes with every district. Hassan district had coconut trees. Tumkur had cactus!!

It poured and poured on the way from Lingdahalli to Birur. We continued for a while then got too wet. Stopped under a tree.

Took breaks almost every 1/2 hour. Was very necessary! For the sake of our bums :). Reached Tumkur by 7 PM. Then on to the 4 lane highway to Bangalore. Reached home after a stop at IISC by 10.30 PM.

What a lovely trip! One of the best!

Photos here : http://www.kodakgallery.com/BrowsePhotos.jsp?&collid=128417334205&page=1&sort_order=0

Bike trip ..

We plan to go on a motorbike trip starting tomorrow morning. Hope we succeed in our mission. May the force be with us.

Destination : seriously thinking of Kemmanagundi near Chikmagalur. My bike's not exactly in great condition but what the heck! We really need to get out of town for a couple of days ..

Anyway, every Indian must visit this site on th enet : www.kamat.com - one of the best websites and collection of photographs I've seen. Really gives me enthu to take up photography as a hobby!

See you people on Monday if everything goes well :-)